What once ensured that I sat at a table next to the teacher is now posted, Monday through Friday.

I've contributed to perhaps the best humor compilation I've ever read. Available now on Amazon!

My second chapbook, "The Second Book of Pearl: The Cats" is now available as either a paper chapbook or as a downloadable item. See below for the Pay Pal link or click on its cover just to the right of the newest blog post to download to your Kindle, iPad, or Nook. Just $3.99 for inspired tales of gin, gambling addiction and inter-feline betrayal.

My first chapbook, I Was Raised to be A Lert is in its third printing and is available both via the PayPal link below and on smashwords! Order one? Download one? It's all for you, baby!

Saturday, April 9, 2011

But Sometimes There's Just a Big Roaring in My Ears...

As one can imagine about someone who writes every day, I like to spend a certain amount of my life with no actual connection to reality.

I find it just works better with my line of thinking.

My favorite fantasies include a mixture of what could conceivably happen with what could never.

In other words, in my head, it is possible for me to rescue Elvis Presley from drowning while waterskiing.

I find that my best daydreaming is done in that nebulous time between awake and asleep.

I love that region, by the way. It’s like a tiny little vacation.

My favorite late-night fantasy, the one I’ve been lulling myself to sleep with lately, involves my having become a highly respected clarinet player, swinging, Benny-Goodman style, with a 40-piece band behind me. Gene Krupa is our steady drummer and a helluva guy if you can keep him off the sauce. Billie Holiday sometimes joins us for a song or two, rising from the table she keeps up front when she knows we’re in town. She plays a hot game of craps and most of the band owes her money.

We play all the hottest spots. Our crowds are hep cats who show up late and host outrageous after-bar parties. My best friends are L’il Jack, Midge, and Paulie, people who wear vintage clothing and pull short, unfiltered cigarettes from mother-of-pearl cases. Paulie and Midge have been together since forever, but Li’l Jack plays the field.

He’s such a hoot.

I am known as a generous soul, and I am forever approached by people who had been mean to me in high school and now wanted to apologize.

They are always profuse with their regrets: “Pearl, we had no idea! Please forgive us for not having recognized your coolness sooner!”

If my difficult childhood has taught me anything, it’s how to be humble in the face of their groveling; and I have the bartender send their table a round of drinks, on my tab, just to show them that there are no hard feelings.

This sometimes leads to misunderstandings, though, and my now-fans try to get closer than I am comfortable with. ‘Hey, Pearl, I love your shoes. So where’s the band going after?’

When I have to make it clear to them, no offense intended, that they just don’t fit into the crowd I hang with now, they are always a little saddened. There are the inevitable tears as the truth of my words sink in; and I am forced to reflect, once again, on the responsibility that my genius carries.

As I say, I like to spend a certain amount of time in my head, away from the madding crowds; but it's not all fun and games in there.

37 comments:

I found YOUR 'rabbit-hole'....and a fine one it is! Thanks for the visit (you ate all the carrots) and I'll be hangin' out here later tonight after we go to the Roller Derby. No, not ME ~ just a friend (Betsy Black Eye) who is skating in a match this evening. Nice to "meet" you.

You must be exhausted. How late do you stay up in your head playing these gigs? If it makes you feel any better, if your bought my table a round, I would NEVER assume I was cool enough to hang. But just out of curiosity, where would the band be going afterward? I'm so NOT going to be following you, probably.

I love this post, but it bugs me people were mean to you in school. That truely sucks.

I love the fantasy life. My favorite was rescuing Harrison Ford who was lost and freezing in the forests of Canada. When I was young I was a rock star or movie actress. I actually never fantasize any more. But it can be fun!

Wow.Your going-to-sleep fantasies have mine beat, hands down.I'm usually walking in the door to my grandmother's house (after good days) or imagining shooting coworkers in the middle of their foreheads and watching them fall down dead. (That would be after bad days.)Either one calms me right down for sleep. :-)

My fantasies involve playing the drums or bass guitar, or ballroom dancing. I cannot actually do any of those, and would look ridiculous trying. Therefore, I am not sure if they fit into the "could never happen" or "could conceivably happen" category. One or the other. Sigh.

The one I love to go to sleep with is a complicated choreographed number. My mustache hairs have grown---agility-wise and otherwise--and they do a frenetic, swingin' dance to Louis Prima's "Jump, Jive and Wail."

Can I borrow your imagination for a while? Put me in as a piano player ok? And I'll sing back up too but only in the alto range. You can throw me the odd sultry number if you want but only after everyone's had a few too many to care.

I have to ask -- how do you save Elvis from drowning??? I always heard he was hanging out at a 7-Eleven in Ohio...Oh wait, you save him from drowning in the slurpy machine.

I love when I can actually break away from the to-do list chatter that runs constantly in my head and get lost in an alternative life which involves being a really clean, uncluttered house on the Mediterranean coast.

Pearl my friend,If someone held a loaded gun against my temple and said "What name are you least likely to ever encounter among all the blogs you read? Your life depends on this; pick a name that shows up and we blow your head off," I would've said "Gene Krupa." If I'm found shot to death tomorrow, my blood is on your hands! Funny post!

I love this blog, you always make me laugh out loud, ( not an easy thing to do) and of course being born in the 40's I am a great fan of your dream buds Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa and the fabulous Billie Holiday ( hard to keep her off the sauce too, so to speak!) Keep 'em coming, Pearl!

That sounds like a fine dream. Keep the rif raf out of the Coconut Room or the Cotton Club. Unfortunately all my dreams have me racing around a pizza place with those old checkered table cloths in a Ferrari with Tom Cruise as that nutcase tries to convince me to direct his 'Hello Kitty' movie. The admiral is hanging onto the car antenna and telling me to take all my points up front and get a large cut of the merchandising. At that point I wake up and try to smoother my life with a pillow but it never works.

2. When I was a kid the Beatles were driving by my house. Their limousine broke down so they had to spend the night at my house (minus their driver). They hung out with me all night and were so impressed that I could harmonize on every one of their songs. Ah... a memory doesn't have to be true to be sweet.

Yup, I love that fantasy world. I spend most of my time there anyway, so you may as well have a blast with it, right? Who says I can't have a unicorn AND be a rock star? Here is a metaphysical cookie, for being the first to comment on my blog! :D